Trump wants to ban violent computer games and films

Strapped for an idea of stopping kids shooting up schools that do not involve some gun control, President Donald (Prince of Orange) Trump is thinking of tougher censorship rules on violent movies and computer games.

Trump said: "We have to do something about what [kids are] seeing and how they see it, And also video games. I'm hearing more and more people say the level of violence in video games is shaping more and more people's thoughts."

Trump followed this statement by referencing "movies that come out that are so violent with the killing and everything else". Children should be banned from watching violent films. "Maybe they have to put a rating system for that."

He apparently has not heard about the MPAA's rating board which began adding specific disclaimers about sexual, drug, and violent content in all rated films since the year 2000.

Trump did not acknowledge recommendations for bans on assault-style weapons during the meeting. He instead used Twitter to recommend raising a minimum gun-buying age to 21 years and ending the sale of assault-rifle bump stocks.

Trump's comments have done down like a bucket of cold sick with the kids of Parkland High School who were the victims of the most recent Valentine’s Day massacre.

One Call of Duty player said that it was all: "just a pathetic excuse on behalf of the president. I grew up playing video games, Call of Duty, all those first-person shooting games. I would never dream of taking the lives of any of my peers."

Trump's comments, though, have some support from other politicians, keen on peddling the fake and debunked science that violent computer games make people more violent.

Kentucky governor Matt Bevin (R) said last week in the wake of the Parkland High School shooting: "There are games that replicate and give people the ability to score points for doing the very same thing that these students are doing inside of schools, where you get extra points for finishing someone off who's lying there begging for their life."

Ars Technica points out that part of the ignorance about shootings and computer games comes from the fact that US politicians have banned anyone funding any serious scientific studies at the request of the gun lobby. Presumably, that is because a scientific study would show that gamers are not psychopaths or that the high numbers of guns in US society might be the cause of the problem.

To be fair Trump has always blamed violent media for school shootings. He even said that after the Sandy Hook school shooting in 2012: "Video game violence & glorification must be stopped—it is creating monsters!"

We guess he thought kids should be playing the sim game, Donald Trump's Real Estate Tycoon, after all, that game never created a monster or much money, although quite a few critics wanted to shoot someone after playing it.